The purchase of and payment for various shipping services, including shipment (often referred to as “posting” or “mailing”, depending upon the particular items) of items, shipping insurance, etc., may be provided for in a number of ways. For example, shipping service providers, such as the United States Postal Service (USPS), United Parcel Service (UPS), Federal Express (FedEx), and others, provide means by which shippers (e.g., individuals and businesses) may directly purchase and pay for shipping services. Likewise, a number of third party vendors, such as Stamps.com (the assignee of the present patent application), ShipStation, etc., also provide means by which shippers may more conveniently and/or less expensively purchase and pay for shipping services. When a shipper purchases and/or pays for selected shipping services from any of the foregoing, some form of proof of prepayment or mechanism for post-payment for the shipping services is generated (collectively referred to as payment indicia), such as in the form of an indicia (e.g., an information based indicia (IBI) as used for postal services) or shipping label (e.g., shipping service provider compliant shipping labels), for including with the item to be shipped.
In some cases, the third party vendors enter into reseller agreements with one or more of the shipping service providers whereby the third party vendor negotiates a discounted rate for various shipping services. Such a reseller may thus resell the shipping services (perhaps at a discount over the shipping service provider's published rate (often referred to as commercial based pricing (CBP))) to their customers at a profit. However, negotiated rates may not be available for all shipping services. For example, the USPS may agree to negotiated rates with respect to some shipping services (e.g., express mail, priority mail, etc.) while remaining non-negotiable with respect to other shipping services (e.g., first class mail, shipping services involving certain special services, etc.). Accordingly, a reseller may be in the position of having different discount and/or profit models with respect to different shipping services, even when provided by the same shipping service provider. As a result, the reseller may be able to provide its discounts with respect to certain shipping services and may either provide other shipping services at an added cost over CBP rates or provide those shipping services without profit margin due to there being no discount available to the reseller.
Further complicating the mixed negotiated/non-negotiated rate situation for the resellers is that the shipping service providers may process particular shipping service purchase transactions differently. For example, the USPS may absorb the costs of processing credit card payments for the direct purchase of postage by a shipper, whereas a reseller may bare that cost for the same shipping service if resold to its customer. Accordingly, on shipping services where a reseller discount is not negotiated (e.g., first class postage) and transaction costs are borne by the reseller, the reseller may be forced to resell these shipping services at a premium over the CBP rates to avoid an out of pocket loss by the reseller. Additionally or alternatively, the reseller may have its customers use a direct shipping service provider account (e.g., requiring the shipper to establish both an account with the reseller and an account directly with the shipping service provider) in order to facilitate the purchase and payment for certain shipping services without requiring out of pocket losses by the reseller in association with these certain shipping services.
The forgoing can be a source of appreciable confusion and great dissatisfaction with the reseller's customers, due to their customers having to manage and maintain two separate accounts, their customers having to understand the separate rating and cost structures, etc. For example, when maintaining multiple accounts, monies added to one account are not available for shipping services purchased through the other such account thus resulting in situations where the shipper has sufficient funds for a shipping service, but which are in the wrong account for obtaining the most economical shipping service alternative. In implementing separate rating and cost structures (e.g., that available through the reseller account and that available through the shipping service provider directly) associated with the different accounts, the reseller may provide a number of alternative rates for various shipping services. For example, the reseller may present its customer with six rates (e.g., USPS First Class, USPS Priority, and USPS Express for the shipping service direct rates and Reseller First Class, Reseller Priority, and Reseller Express for the reseller rates) for the same shipping transaction, for selection by the shipper. The difference in rates, and the reason for their differences, may present a source of confusion to the shipper.
It can be appreciated that, if the services of more than one shipping service provider (e.g., a combination of any of USPS, UPS, FedEx, etc.) were to be accommodated by a third party vendor, the foregoing problems would compound. For example, a reseller's customer may be required to establish, manage, and maintain accounts with each such shipping service provider. Moreover, reseller agreements often prohibit the reseller from simultaneously presenting the rate information of different shipping services providers to a user for rate shopping, thereby resulting in a complicated user interface if a user is to be provided the opportunity to optimize their shipping purchases.